ArticlePublic health nutrition2018
Food industry sponsorship of academic research: investigating commercial bias in the research agenda.
Article in Public health nutrition, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 27 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
27 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Food fortification with multiple micronutrients: impact on health outcomes in general population.The Cochrane database of systematic reviews · 2019Pooled it
- Adherence to dietary guidelines for the Spanish population and risk of overweight/obesity in the SUN cohort.PloS one · 2019Trial
- State of the Science on Ultra-processed Foods and the Ultra-processed Food Addiction Construct.Current obesity reports · 2026Review
- Ultraprocessed Food and Corporate Influence: Evidence, Regulation, and Policy Pathways to Address Chronic Disease in the United States.American journal of public health · 2026Article
- Where to Next for Māori Health Research Review Processes? Insights Into the Indigenous Context: An Integrative Systematic Literature Review.Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand · 2026Review
- Structural funding bias in red meat research: the elephant in the room.The American journal of clinical nutrition · 2025Article
- How governments influence public health research: a scoping review.Health promotion international · 2025Article
- Using a systems thinking approach to map the global rise of ultra-processed foods in population diets.Obesity reviews : an official journal of the International Association for the Study of Obesity · 2025Review
- Advancing whose interests? Corporate strategy and risks to food systems transformation and public health nutrition through academic partnerships in Africa.BMJ global health · 2025Article
- An unbiased, sustainable, evidence-informed Universal Food Guide: a timely template for national food guides.Nutrition journal · 2024Review
- Big food and drink sponsorship of conferences and speakers: a case study of one multinational company's influence over knowledge dissemination and professional engagement.Public health nutrition · 2023Article
- Article
- Conflicts of interest for members of the US 2020 dietary guidelines advisory committee.Public health nutrition · 2022Article
- Corporate political activity in the context of unhealthy food advertising restrictions across Transport for London: A qualitative case study.PLoS medicine · 2021Article
- Conceptualizing the commercial determinants of dietary behaviors associated with obesity: A systematic review using principles from critical interpretative synthesis.Obesity science & practice · 2021Review
- Commercial use of evidence in public health policy: a critical assessment of food industry submissions to global-level consultations on non-communicable disease prevention.BMJ global health · 2021Article
- Conflicted and confused? Health harming industries and research funding in leading UK universities.BMJ (Clinical research ed.) · 2021Article
- Exploring healthcare professionals' views of the acceptability of delivering interventions to promote healthy infant feeding practices within primary care: a qualitative interview study.Public health nutrition · 2021Article
- Involvement of the food industry in nutrition conferences in Latin America and the Caribbean.Public health nutrition · 2021Article
- Declared funding and authorship by alcohol industry actors in the scientific literature: a bibliometric study.European journal of public health · 2020Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectiveTo identify scientific publications that result from food industry-funded projects on human health and to characterize their research topics to assess the potential for bias in the research agenda.
designCross-sectional analysis.Setting/SubjectsFood industry-supported projects related to human health were identified from food company websites; publications resulting from the food industry-sponsored projects were identified through a PubMed search.
resultsOf ten companies analysed, only two (Coca-Cola and the Mars Center for Cocoa Health Science) provided a list of research projects with sufficient detail for analysis. Among the 204 publications resulting from thirty-seven disclosed research projects, the most common topic was physical activity (40·7 %), while highly processed foods were analysed in 10·8 % of the publications. Twenty-two publications (10·8 %) focused on research integrity or research methods.
conclusionsPublications resulting from Coca-Cola- and Mars-sponsored research appear to skew the evidence towards solutions that favour industry interests by focusing on food components that can be manipulated and marketed by food companies. These food industry-funded publications can also distract from nutrition as a health issue by diverting public and policy attention to physical activity. Shaping the debate around scientific methods can be another strategy that corporations use for their benefit to raise doubts about the methods used in non-industry sponsored research.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.